Tag Archives: daily ministration

As you may or may not know, I like to read books frequently. I aim at a bare minimum to read one full book a month. From time to time I may add an additional eBook to go alongside. This keeps the mind ticking, it keeps me progressing to where I want to get to and finally is a high valued hobby of mine. I don’t just buy books from anywhere and I always look for the best deals. Time and time again I find that Amazon is the place to go to get my books (later in the article I will tell you how I buy from Amazon).

Usually once a month I go to Amazon and purchase the book I will read for a future month. I purchased a few books a few months back, So I am basically set for the rest of the year. Starting next year I may just buy 12 books in advance and have the reading set out already. What I would then do is purchase books also throughout the year and read them as I please. Some of you may be thinking by now Amazon isn’t nothing special, give me something new. For those of you thinking this way, we will now look at how I buy my books from Amazon. And I will use a few real life examples I have come across.

I have spoken in recent articles about how important recommendation is in today’s world. Many books I read have been recommended from others or by the books I have read. When I want to purchase a book I go to Amazon and search for the book. After finding the book (maybe one time I haven’t found the book). I click on the book and observe the price. What I then do if I haven’t checked reviews prior is read through reviews (good and bad). I want to see what people think about it. Some bad reviews may not be valid for me and vice versa with good reviews. After I have fully decided to buy the book, I immediately click on “USED.” No typo, yes the used section. And scout the price difference. What you will find is, usually the prices are dramatically different (remember I will show you real life examples below). I then look for the book which has a “Like new” or “Very good” next to it and this is my book. What you will find is these two types of descriptive books are just as good as the new copy you would have bought for sometimes 5x the price. You will begin to save loads of money and ultimately this is money you will pay for all your future books. Find my live examples below.

I purchased “The Millionaire Next Door – Thomas J Stanley” earlier this year for £0.63. With postage it ended up less than £3.50. This was a hardcover book which was “Like new” and looked like it had never been touched when I opened the envelope. To purchase the book “New” would have cost me £15 upwards from Amazon. I could buy 5 copies basically for the price of this one new book. The four other books will be the next four months (think about it).

I bought “Today Matters – John C Maxwell” for £1.58. Including postage it came to less than £4.50. This again was hardcover format. What I saw on Amazon’s site when I checked for a new copy can’t be right. For a new copy of the book, it would cost over £30 to purchase it. These are just two examples and I have more like this. The point is, you could be saving loads of money.

I’ve taken a couple of days off from my bike riding. And this would be problematic if I wasn’t about to type the words, I have still be working out. I’ve still been ensuring I keep up the cardio work, as well as doing some added stuff around it too. Should be back on the bike soon but If not. I will still be doing different forms of exercise to keep me on the right path. A friend also recommended a book called “The Pyramid Diet” by Danni Levy (the funny thing is I used to watched some of here programmes when I watched the active channel). I took a quick look at reviews but will do more on it today. Don’t go and run to buy it because although I know recommendations are the main way people act. I have not yet done any in-depth research and have not even purchased it. Perhaps after purchase and implementation I will feel like I can do so. In my next article, find out where I buy my books from and how I do so. It will be entitled “Where I Buy My Books And How”

And I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God. For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling. And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power: that your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.

My daily morning reading had me reading a few verses from the Bible. The message here is simple. And It applies across many fields of life. Once I started reading this, I was immediately thinking about how the things we do stand the test of others. What Paul is writing about here is not talking to people in a way that convinces them. He referred to showing people! If I say something to you, you may take it one way. You may even believe what I am saying. What I do know however, is if I demonstrated to you, you would most likely be more believing. This is the simplicity of what Paul is writing here.

Ask yourself an honest question now, how easy is it to convince you of something you believe in? If someone came to you today and delivered a mouth-watering presentation, refuting your most cherished belief. How would you react? The sad fact is many would waver and then perhaps stop believing. The route of this article comes to what you believe in and why you believe in it. I know people who believe because others do. Do you go to work every day because others have told you this is the right thing to do. Do you worship the God you believe in, or not worship because this is what you see? Have you never questioned those people who gave you these beliefs from childhood? If you haven’t, I strongly urge you to do so swiftly.

How much stock is invested in your every decision? Do you really make the decisions in your life or is someone else driving the car?

If you are following my bike riding series, you will know from that I stress the hard parts of stopping something for so long and then aiming to come back and start again. Greek was another thing I had put down for a few months and I guess it was a good idea for me not to go to Greece a few months back because in terms of the lingo, I was nowhere near I wanted to be.

Here’s a picture of me looking over my work of previous months, becoming re-acquainted with the language and remembering the different letters of the alphabet, different rules about specific letters (if you zoom in to this picture you can see a rule I wrote down about the letter “s” which is sigma in Greek).

To be honest I didn’t do as much as I thought I would but it was mainly based on review and re-establishing the work I had done previously. I only spent a little while looking over the notes (I normally aim to practice for 45 minutes with a countdown timer running – this increases intensity and forces me (well it should do) to work at my best due to the fact there is a clock counting down).

I really did get the understanding back when I looked over my previous notes and I guess it is a good platform to start from. The main purpose for learning the Greek language is to take my Bible study to the next level, therefore I am not using something like Rosetta Stone or something like that. I am currently using a video class based on learning Bible Greek. It comprises of short 4-5 minute videos which I aim to do daily.

More updates in the future. Please et me know if you have any tips which can help me learn more efficiently within the scope of what I have described.

The one day at a time rule means taking one day at a time. Lets say for example, every day you want to write a blog post. Perhaps setting a time every day to sit down and start writing may be the easiest way. Perhaps you’re so busy you just wait for an expected time in the day and start writing. One day at a time is a great principle. It is really simple. Every day you write down what needs to be done today and you go through the list. Long tasks which take longer than a day are broken down into days and after a certain amount of days the task is complete.

I do this task with book reading. I aim to read one main book each month and maybe a side book (like an ebook) alongside. The current book I am reading is about 300 pages, mathematically it would be about 10 pages a day but I don’t necessarily meet this requirement. For example, I read about 15-20 pages yesterday, today I may read more. I usually finish within the month and then spend the last days reviewing and rereading chapters. I remember when I read Today Matters by John Maxwell, I read the book in about 15-20 days and basically reread the book. Last month I finished reading my main monthly book in 10 days or so and barely touched the book again. One day at a time for me doesn’t mean I have to do the same things over and over again, but it does mean I need to give my best. Sometimes I adhere, other times I don’t. My aim is to obviously be consistent.

You don’t have to treat everything like this but if you slowly start to implement this strategy for tasks, you will start to reap it’s benefits.